This is the seventh installment of my short story “The Wars”. If you haven’t already read Chapters 1 – 6 you can

< click here to read Chapter 1 >

< click here to read Chapter 2 >

< click here to read Chapter 3 >

< click here to read Chapter 4 >

< click here to read Chapter 5 >

< click here to read Chapter 6 >

Please read the Chapter 1 intro to understand a little more of this story.

Also, there is a disclaimer that you can read there as well.

Okay, I’ve thought about it and let’s talk about the first year or so. That is, if it’s alright with you. If it isn’t, too bad. [Dad still chuckles once in a while. He use to laugh a lot. Not so much since Lisa died.]

I already told you about your escape from Florida and getting here. You guys all went straight to bed, didn’t blame you a bit, I would have too. Lisa started cooking, a real feast that night! Me, well I got geared up and went to guarding the place. I had no idea if anyone was following you, who it might be, what they might do, nothing. So, guns it was. Sometimes violence is the answer.

I just kept moving around, find a spot sit there for 30 minutes, move, repeat. Stayed on the higher ground mostly. No problems showed up. Glad for that tender mercy. Should have stayed put longer. Anyone with a brain that was watching the place would know to lay low for an hour or so and just watch for movement. My mistake.

Funny, how the house was so full of people sleeping everywhere. Man, Robbie could snore. Sounded like a freight train at times. The kids were cute, all flaked out, blissful slumber. Oh, how I wish we could have frozen life in that moment! Just kept it right here.

That night was one for the record books! We ate till we almost busted apart at the seems, laughed, carried on, and enjoyed that campfire like there was no tomorrow. Actually, I think most of us thought there might not be a tomorrow, or at least not many of them. Thankfully we were wrong. There were plenty of tomorrows, just not all of them real pleasant.

And you didn’t fool me for a minute, I knew you and Robbie had a bottle.You guys would “go check on” something or another and sneak a swig. I could smell it on you. Never said a thing to you, it had been a hard few days. Me, well I downed 3 cans of Pepsi that night. What a party!

The next morning we started. Yeah, got out the checklists from the website and went down them item-by-item. Of course you and I and Robbie were into the threat of violence more than the other lists. But we got a reality check pretty dang quick. Food!

I don’t even remember the day of the week it was but it was the second day I know. We got the tractor fired up and tore up the yard, disc’d it up, then planted the rest of the Anasazi beans, more potatoes, then what corn seed we had left. It all looked good, and I am thankful we did that extra planting, we needed that food to help subsidize the stored stuff.[I think he meant supplement.]

I do remember we held back 10 of the Anasazi beans. I said I wanted enough beans for seeds leftover in case the stuff we planted got trashed. It was important to have something to plant next year. We never did need them, but I am glad we kept them all the same. Then we went to work on planting the rest of the raised beds.

It was hilarious! We were out there all arguing about what to plant and where and how…a real clown show. Then Alice came out. Yeah, we turned it all over to her and we became nothing more than day labor. That was real tough for me to do since it was my garden. But I remember my ICS days, turn over areas of responsibility to those with the most skill in that area.

Dang, we got a great harvest out of the garden that year, even with the annual hail storm every September. I can’t imagine what that first year would have looked like without the garden. We had enough food but I definitely think there would have been some food fatigue had we not had all that fresh stuff.

And Hayden, I didn’t think I had any competition for loving strawberries until I saw him pack em away. And you and your blueberry obsession! Lisa cut you a lot of slack there son, she sure did. Those blueberries came in real handy when it came to stepping up all that oatmeal. Remember all the care we took with the canes starting new berry plants that fall and winter. Even starting new blueberry plants. It was hard work but it sure did pay off. I wish the fruit trees had done as well. But man-o-man, no one has a berry patch like we do! It was really nice having all those sister plants to share and barter with the neighbors.

Thank goodness we had planned for this eventuality and had a decent stock of food stored. Without it we would have been like so many other families, starving and desperate. There was so much compassion and charity back then at first. Families who ran out of food were offered the basics, sometimes more. Most of those families were very grateful, some even exchanged work for food; they got preference.

Then there a few families and individuals that raised a stink over being given wheat, oats, and beans. How many times we heard “we can’t eat wheat!” or “I hate oatmeal!” and then there was “beans give me gas.” They wanted meals, lasagna, fresh bread, meat, french fries, and steak!! They thought those of us with food were holding out on them, that we were selfish somehow, that we had an obligation to share. The worst of those folks would use the line, “Christians are supposed to have charity.” I hated that one. We are Christians, we did have charity, we did offer food, we didn’t want them to starve. They just wanted to be treated like damn kings and queens!

We sure did back off after a couple of months, even with the Frisks. Remember them, Earl and Marry just south of us; you gotta remember them. Of course you do. I mean Robbie and family took over their place after they were killed.

[Of course I remembered them. I don’t know why Dad would have thought I didn’t. I just nodded my head to let Dad know I remembered them.]

Earl was a nice enough guy, a little lazy maybe. Then again he did say he was a disabled veteran with a knee replaced and all sorts of PTSD. He got stuff done, but he was real slow about it. He bought his place in 2018 I think. Had to gut it. Lisa and I did as much work on his place as he did, maybe a bit more. I kept telling him to step up the pace but he just plodded along. By the time everything went down the crapper he had the basics done to the house but nothing more than that. No garden for sure. And they only had about 10 days of food on hand when it hit.

He did try to put in a garden, used that junkie little roto-tiller. Or at least tried to. I told him that thing didn’t have the power to work that rocky soil. Even if it could, that soil was dead as a door nail, nothing but sand and rock. I told him from the get-go he needed raised beds like ours, even tried to help him. He was so cock-sure that a regular in-ground garden would work; he thought I just didn’t know how to do it. Not a damn thing grew in that garden! No organic matter, didn’t water it enough, doomed from the start.

We had them eat with us a few times, he wasn’t thrilled with the strews and soups; said there wasn’t real meat in them. There was, but only a fraction of what he thought there should be. We augmented the meat with cooked wheat berries and sometimes meat flavored TVP. He chided us about the TVP, said it was laced with estrogen and would make women out of us guys. He never realized he wasn’t eating near enough TVP to make any kind of difference at all. He just wanted meat, meat, meat.

I remember that day we offered food to him on a more regular basis if he would work on our place and in our garden, etc. I saw him turn red, red as a beet. He said he was our security to the south and we had a mutual defense agreement and that should be plenty, after-all he was a combat vet. Well first off, I was never convinced he actually saw combat himself. Second, by the way he acted and planned in defending his place, well, let’s just say I had my doubts.

I still regret not treating him better. The day he and Mary were killed still haunt me, I regret it. I regret it a lot.

Son, you remember that day? It was mid-afternoon late summer, maybe September, yes? We heard his dogs start barking their heads off. By the time we figured it was a serous problem, maybe 1 – 2 minutes went by, then shooting started. It was a bunch of shots, I mean a bunch. Remember all that brass we found?

Our first obligation was to our own people. We got the kids gathered up and to safety inside the main house. The women finished getting tactical. You, Robbie, and I started that way; probably 10 – 12 minutes after the shooting stopped, probably not more than 15 – 20 minutes after the dogs had started barking. Robbie and I headed straight down the 2-track between our places, you were flanking them to the west. I hated what we found, still can see it in my head like it was this morning. All that blood on the front porch.

The dogs were gone off their chains, Mary was crumbled up on the front porch. She was dead, maybe 15 or so pieces of brass laying around her. I know it had to have been from her AR. Earl was in the living room, shot maybe, what, 5 or 6 times. He was still in his underwear. Not a single piece of brass near him, or anywhere else in the house. Those boys who hit them were gone by the time we got there, carried off what they could. Mostly they got Earl’s guns. They didn’t have food to speak of just laying around to steal. They did leave a 5lb bag of oats we had given them. Picky pricks.

I still say Earl was taking a nap in the bedroom, Mary had been in the living room or kitchen. She heard the dogs, grabbed her AR, and headed out the front door. She put up a short fight but died doing it. I think somewhere in all of that Earl woke up with the sound of shooting and headed into the front room. By then they were already inside and shot him where he stood.

Man, do you remember that discussion about going after them!? I think we all argued both sides of the idea and then some. Three of us, 15 different opinions on what to do. I am glad we made the decision we did. Robbie headed back to be with the families, you and I started tracking them. That wasn’t hard, they made no effort to hide their tracks. I guess they figured no one had the balls to follow them. We did, for damn sure!

There was four of them, we got to their little shack about an hour later where there were those two women, if you want to call them that. I still think they were all meth heads. They sure did start to whoop it up celebrating their hit and run. I am so glad I listened to you. I just wanted to start shooting them right then and there, but you said no, we had to wait. You were right, glad I listened.

God, that was an awful night! I would never have guessed how bad it would get. They built that big old campfire like they were having a party. Started drinking the homemade hooch of theirs. Man, they got drunk. Then they started smoking that crap. The big guy walked over to Frisk’s dogs tied up to the tree. Before I could realize what he was doing he slit the throat of the smaller of the two dogs, Zephyr was his name. Poor dog never knew what happened, he bled out in just a minute or two. The other German Sheppard, the big young one, Ace, he went ballistic but that big guy hit him in the head with is pistol and I think knocked him out. Remember that?

Twenty minutes later the dead dog was gutted, skinned, and on a spit over their fire. I really think I was in shock at the time. But I did know I was going to kill that guy, kill him, kill him. And I did. [Dad drifted off for a minute. I let him be. I think he was back there in the past reliving it. His eyes reddened.]

Yeah, finally all of them were around the fire in a pretty close group, all drunk, high, or whatever. I told David I was going to take the big guy first, he took the guy that appeared to be the leader. We were going to leave the women for last.

I popped the big guy with a shot to the head, you fired almost at the same instant taking out the other guy. We both took our second targets with the next shot. It did surprise me that the women moved as fast as they did. They were disoriented at first with our initial shots and sound. But we dropped both of them as they were shouldering their guns. Remember that?

One of the most satisfying moments of the last 25 years was the fact that the big guy was still alive when we walked up to the campfire. I thought I did a clean head shot, nope. It hit his clavicle and took the snot right out of him. And although he was till alive he was stunned, bleeding and staring up at me. He didn’t say anything but looked at me like he was asking for help. I helped him alright!

I remember that smile of mine. Not sure what it looked like to him, I hope it looked as evil as he had ever seen. I pointed that AR of mine at his head and pulled the trigger as slowly as I ever had. I wanted him to know he was about to die. I was never so glad to kill someone as I was when I pulled that trigger.

We took all the guns and ammo we could find and hid them about 100’ from their shanty in some thick stand of junipers. Only took a couple of minutes. We talked about taking the guns, but there were too many and too much ammo. We came back later and recovered all of it. We didn’t want to hang around too long right then just in case someone came to help them or see what what going on.

Poor Ace, he was banged up pretty bad and kinda out of it. When I walked up to him thankfully he recognized me and allowed me to untie him. He ran off like a missile, other than a little stumbling at first.

We leap-frogged back to our place not wasting time, but not going too fast to forget the danger we might be in. The last 150yds we covered our tracks by dragging Juniper branches. Didn’t know if that helped or not, but it seemed like the right thing to do. Ace found us just as we crossed through the gate. He never left after that, he was ours from that moment on. I wonder why he didn’t just keep running?

Talking through it the next day, we decided that Robbie’s family would take over Fisk’s place. If any of their family ever came around to claim it Robbie would give it up. But it made no sense to just leave it there to rot away or have scatters come in and take it over. They are still there to this day. Place looks pretty damn nice if you ask me. Did a great job on it. Well, all of us did. No way Robbie could do that much work on his own!

[Yeah, dad smiled at that too. He has always given Robbie a hard time about his work ethic. Dad kids around with just about everybody. If he doesn’t, then he doesn’t like you or doesn’t trust you. Most people get Dad, some don’t. I thinnk I got his sense of humor…unfortunately.]

It really hurt to have to bury them. In the cold light of day though, I don’t think they could have made it very long anyways. Just not the right combination of skills, knowledge, abilities, motivation, logic, and willingness to do what was needed fast enough. Then again, there was only two of them, and both in their 50’s. They needed more people there. Maybe if their kids and family could have gotten there soon enough, but they didn’t for whatever reason. What a shame.

[Dad kinda drifted again off at that point. I suggested a break, he didn’t even respond. I am worried when he gets like this. It is happening more and more. It’s like he goes somewhere, back into memories about all the stuff that happened.]

We were talking about the first year or so after you guys got here. A lot was going on, a whole lot. I remember the most frustrating thing was the Ham radios. Dang! We had all that nice Yaesu equipment, all the right antennas, power, all of it. And we struggled for months to get it all up and running right. Thankfully we had all the manuals and some third-party tip documents. The best of it was the Yaesu FT-897D multi-band. We had those two long wire antennas along with the dual-band antenna hooked up tot hat antenna switch. It sure gives us the ability to reach out and talk to folks. A reliable way to communicate with the right kind of people to get real information.

Man, it was nice that Elon Musk was as smart as he was, and as rich as he was. He kept that StarLink system running when the Internet was basically shutdown by the NSA and CIA for awhile. Musk opened that system up to everyone and kept the web running for the most part. All those little satellites and servers worked. You remember how they called him the ring leader of domestic terrorism for a while. They tried to kill him so many times. That little army of his saved his butt! Those billions bought him those retired special ops guys who were extremely devoted to him. The government never could touch him. Thankful for that.

He really showed who he was when the rebuilding started. He built those vehicle plants so they could start building those EV’s and other stuff with almost no real worries. And those EV’s without all the government mandated BS. Now those trucks rocked! He almost single-handedly brought back manufacturing to America. I don’t begrudge him a single dollar he made, he earned every penny of it. The coolest thing of all was how he built those plants in solidly libertarian and conservative communities, then supported the communities with money to build up infrastructure, homes, shops, and everything else you can imagine. But did you ever think how he never gave a dime to schools? He was all about home-schooling not government schooling.

Back to the radio thing. It was tough with the bigger radios. But, those little walkies-talkies were incredible and valuable beyond belief. I’m glad we had the larger radio batteries for them along with plenty of extras. Some of them are still running just fine. But in those early days I just don’t know how much harder it would have been without them. Gave us a serious edge with good communications.

Remember when we ran that comm wire to Robbie’s place? Ran two sets of wire, one kinda underground, the other strung from tree to tree. Then put in those WW2 army surplus telephones. Didn’t have to really use those because of the radios but it was nice for the kids or when we wanted to talk in the open and not over the radios.

The women sure gave us a hard time about the two set of wires, remember that? We kept it to ourselves for two days till Lisa figured out it was for a back-up. The wire run in the trees was a decoy more than anything but it worked!

You know when you think about it, those checklists we used really paid off. Using the 7 areas of prepping made all the sense in the world, gave us order and organization to what needed to be done. You know, priorities.

[Dad, how easy was it for us to get reliable information that first year?]

Damn near impossible if truth be told!

The government always told lies since I can remember as a kid even. I never could figure out why they thought it was necessary to always lie about everything. It was as if they had to build this reality that suited them vs just telling the truth as it was. Now, looking back, it made sense; they just wanted to manipulate everyone about everything. Had they just told the truth I don’t think people would have lost trust and confidence in the government. And the crap would never have happened.

Governments are always about power, even our own back then. The Declaration of Independence laid out the sole purpose of government. The Constitution pretty much limited it to that. But over the years, based on the lies out of Washington, they were able to manipulate the US into that dark version of authoritarianism. I give them credit, those bastards in Washington were smart, they did it real subtle like. Hell, they actually made people beg for some of those changes.

Don’t ever trust government! Don’t ever trust politicians! Neither can be trusted, ever! PERIOD!! You have to stay on them, verify everything they are saying and doing. Then pounce on them even the first time they get out of their lane or lie. And I mean pounce!! If you don’t, then they just lie more and more.

I will give the new folks credit, that pre-law Constitutional review process is one of the best things to come out of the 3^rd Constitutional Convention. I think something like that might have helped prevent the authoritarians from building their little US Empire back in the day. Maybe not stopped it entirely, but helped slow it down. Maybe stopped it. Back then there just wasn’t the tools, the courage, or the balls to stop those slime ball politicians. Today they know if they start pulling their crap they pay a price and quick. Should have always been that way.

I don’t want to talk about this any more. Reliable news was hard to come by period. Nothing in the mainstream media was true. Nothing, or almost nothing, that came out of cable news was true, or at least agenda free. Most websites pundits were idiots, just idiots. Some were government assets, most were just plain idiots. Almost all of them had agendas, including me. My agenda was classical liberalism [civil-society libertarianism] like our Founding Fathers, advocating for the Declaration of Independence, US Constitution, and the Bill of Rights. And damn limited government!!

I’m going for a walk in the south garden, leave me alone for awhile. Have the kids come get me when supper is ready.

[Dad gets so frustrated talking about this stuff. I shouldn’t have pushed him. He gets so disappointed with himself that he couldn’t have done more with his website. He tried, man he tried. But, he just couldn’t reach enough people, or the right people, to make a real difference in the big scheme of things. There are dozens of families that I know who he helped. I am sure there are more. He just gets frustrated, then mad. The walk will do him good, he likes the garden. I am worried about him though. I don’t know what to do to help him. Having the kids around helps a lot. They tease him as much as he teases them. It’s good for him.]

<- click here to read Chapter 6                                              click here to read Chapter 8 ->

Short Story Chapters –

• The Wars: Chapter 1
• The Wars: Chapter 2
• The Wars: Chapter 3
• The Wars: Chapter 4
• The Wars: Chapter 5
• The Wars: Chapter 6
• The Wars: Chapter 7
• The Wars: Chapter 8
• The Wars: Chapter 9
• The Wars: Chapter 10

The Check Lists –

• Check List – Introduction
• Check List – Violence
• Check List – Injury or Sickness
• Check List – Communications
• Check List – Organization
• Check List – Starvation (food storage)
• Check List – Dehydration (water storage)
• Check List – Exposure
• Check List – Misc.

Related Articles –

• Layering & the Common 7: Introduction

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This is the sixth installment of my short story “The Wars”. If you haven’t already read Chapters 1 – 5 you can

< click here to read Chapter 1 >

< click here to read Chapter 2 >

< click here to read Chapter 3 >

< click here to read Chapter 4 >

< click here to read Chapter 5 >

Please read the Chapter 1 intro to understand a little more of this story.

Also, there is a disclaimer that you can read there as well.

[Dad, I’m going to ask you to talk about 3 major events; 1) what about the military, 2) how the country reformed, 3) what was the first year like. Think about those over the next week or so and then share with me what you remember. But, I also want to ask you a couple easy ones that won’t take much time. Here is #1; what is your biggest regret?]

Son, when you’ve lived the life I have, there are lots of regrets. But, I assume you are referring to the country and what happened. Yes? [I nodded my head in the affirmative.]

Well, again, there are a fair number of those too. But, you remember I ran that website for a long time; that old stuff is still around somewhere. I did speak out a bunch, posted lots of information, didn’t get a lot of notice. The people that did follow me were a bunch of decent and smart people. Most of them listened and were ready. A couple of families even found the church because of it. But, there were millions that weren’t ready. I wish I could have reached more folks. That isn’t the biggest regret though, it just troubles me that I couldn’t do more.

So my biggest regret is pretty big in scope, applies to the entire country actually. Here it is, I regret that “we the people” didn’t truly understand what our Founding Fathers did and what they wanted for us. The opening of the US Constitution reads…

“We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.”

[Yes, he recited that from memory!]

Think real serious about those words for a minute. ALL of the power rested in the hands of normal, everyday people; citizens of the United States. Look at what the whole, and only, purposes of the government were:

1. establish justice,

2. insure domestic tranquility,

3. provide for the common defense,

4. promote the general welfare,

5. secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity.

The first three of self-explanatory. Number four doesn’t mean handouts from the government kind of welfare that allows people to live off others’ labors. The term “welfare” back then didn’t mean anything of the like.

Let me look something up and give it to you to write down correctly.

“General Public- common meaning; relating to or comprehending the whole community; as the general interest or safety of a nation. Welfare- common meaning; Exemption from any unusual evil or calamity; the enjoyment of peace and prosperity, or the ordinary blessings of society and civil government; applied to states.” Websters 1828 Dictionary

Pretty damn clear that the Constitution limited what the government could do and spend, and it was not for, or to serve, individuals, it was for the country as a whole.

Now, Article 1 Section 8 gave power to Congress to “…lay and collect Taxes, Duties, Imposts and Excises, to pay the Debts and provide for the common Defense and general Welfare of the United States…” See where it says that those taxes, etc. are to pay US debts and defend the US and, as I showed before, protecting the country as a whole from evil or civil calamity, to enjoy peace and prosperity. And again, “peace” meant that the federal government should leave people alone.

But most of all the US Constitution was to secure liberty for individuals. And therein is the problem, although it is all tied together.

As with virtually all people, power goes to their head and corrupts them, and it did so pretty quickly in the US in the early days. When Congress and the President realized they could spend money, other people’s money, raised through taxes they did so pretty freely. When they needed more money to spend they simply raised taxes or borrowed it. That is not the way the Constitution reads. But the Supreme Court kept interpreting that spending and raising taxes was perfectly legit. Yeah, remember the Supreme Court is part of the US government, thus self-serving to say the least.

As their quest for more and more power became the norm, the people lost their power through diminished rights, liberties, and freedoms; and lost more of their money as well.

So here is my biggest regret, we the people let it happen. Hell, most of the time we voted in the bastards that did it to us!

No, I’m going to change that. My biggest regret is actually not doing something sooner to take back the power that they weaseled out of us. Government at all levels became the power, the authoritarians, the dictators, the masters, and we became little more than slaves, serfs, and ATM machines. As government grew in size and power there was a direct correlation in the shrinking of people’s rights, liberties, and freedoms, as well as their ability to live a comfortable life financially. People just took it, allowed it to happen!

There developed this unholy alliance between government and the rich elites. And I mean at all levels of government, but especially at the federal level because that is where the most power was. That all started back in the late 1800’s. In the early 1900’s at least there were newspapers with journalists to investigate and report about all the corruption. But that came to an end as the rich elites bought up the newspapers. By the 2020’s there were few sources of real information. Carlson and Beck probably the best and most reliable of those still independent voices.

My point is that people gobbled up the trash crap news that the media fed them. We had some of the most stupid people in the history of mankind living in the US back then. People would rather watch soap operas or watch TV shows about the freaking Kardashians than understand the next war the US was planning on starting or how the government was spending their children’s future through deficit spending. It was pathetic! No wonder they quit teaching civics, history, and government in public schools back in the 1990’s.

In our defense, there were very few people who knew what was going on, but most people were blissfully stupid. And the elites loved it! Government will take care of you cradle to grave and the big corporations will give you a little money to live on but then take away your soul.

Finally in the early 2020’s people started to get really agitated with the government. The COVID pandemic farce really did it. By the end of that there was no stopping the revolution, the wars as you call it. It was inevitable by then. I regret we didn’t stop the government back in the 1980’s or even the 1990’s when we had a chance to do it without all the blood.

As far as in my lifetime; President Eisenhower warned us about the military-industrial complex. He also warned us about the meshing of government and education, and even the encroachment of government over agriculture. President Kennedy tried to straighten things out, especially with the out-of-control evils perpetrated by the CIA. He was assassinated for it. Nixon took us off the gold standard and established a fiat currency. Then he brought China into the world as an emerging empire and I believe that was the true start of the world’s elitist plan. President Reagan tried to turn it around in the 1980’s but even he couldn’t.

Then came the CIA agent George Bush who really started the authoritarians in power. Ironically, on 9/11/1990 he exposed the truth of what was happening when he stated for everyone to hear, the elites were establishing “a new world order”. Clinton laid the groundwork for World Trade Center 9/11 to occur. Bush #2 moved us firmly into the authoritarian age with the Patriot Act, NDAA, the Homeland Security Act, and a host of other acts that killed rights, freedoms, and liberties after 9/11/2001. He is responsible for creating the behemoth Department of Homeland Security. He also started decades of wars that cost us 10’s of thousands of US military casualties and trillions and trillions of dollars, all of it debt.

Obama, the Marxist creep, cemented authoritarian infrastructure that no president after him could disassemble. Big T couldn’t really make any real changes, they were waging a coup against him from the very beginning. But he wasn’t a real Constitutionalist anyways. And by JoeyP, he was nothing more than a puppet for his elitist masters, it was far too late by then.

While my regret may be real and tragic, a bloodless resolution to all of this government crap was realistically never possible. It all had to come down to the shedding of blood to right the ship. Thomas Jefferson was right all the way back in 1787,

“…what country can preserve it’s liberties if their rulers are not warned from time to time that their people preserve the spirit of resistance? Let them take arms. The remedy is to set them right as to facts, pardon and pacify them. What signify a few lives lost in a century or two? The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants. It is it’s natural manure.”

[No, he couldn’t recite it from memory. We looked it up.]

Had we listened to Jefferson and periodically set government right, and reminded them of who had the source of power, and that government was to be severely limited, we could haven then prevent the last 200 years of crap. But nope, we didn’t listen to Jefferson, we didn’t believe him, we became little more than sheep to the slaughter. At least until it just became too much to bear. Then too much blood was shed, too many lives lost, too many good people would never see their children grow up, too many children dead. All for what? Our cowardice for all those years.

That is my biggest regret.

What’s next?

[What is the funniest thing that happened to you during those years?]

That’s an easy one, I made a fool out of myself. [Dad rolled his eyes.] Yeah, go figure. In 2025, maybe 26, we had the glamstead running smoothly. Gardens were producing almost all of our food, meat rabbits were giving us steady protein, the rare but occasional deer wandered by for a treat, the well was providing plenty of water even though we had to supplement it occasionally at night with a generator. I mean everything was going really well.

Then came the big refugee surge, I don’t remember the year exactly, I use to. Anyways, the church was a central point for a lot of them, mostly church members. We had never been approached before about taking in refugees and I was glad for that even though we had over 40 acres and Robbie’s 10 acres. Then the church’s local relocation coordinator came to us with an offer. There was a podiatrist with wife and 5 kids, mostly teenagers. No!

I didn’t want to hear any more of it. We didn’t need some foot doctor and we didn’t need teenagers running around like wild animals eating up tons of food. No!

This coordinator, I think his name was Shane, patient and really kind, gentle actually. He seemed out of place in that world then. Yeah, his name was Shane, real nice guy. He shared that DPMs were trained essentially as medical doctors but with an emphasis on lower extremities. No!

Shane went on pretty much ignoring me. He said that they would come with a mobile home, their own transportation, a fuel ration, tools, about 1500lbs of food stuffs, and everything else to not be a burden on us. No!

He would have a small but sturdy shed building for a clinic that would be open to those in our immediate community. And if called upon, he would assist in wider medical responsibilities in the county. No!

By then I was pretty worked up and had it been anyone other than Shane I would have run him off without listening at all. Like I said, Shane was patient with me to say the least. He asked me to just meet the family on Sunday and visit for a few minutes, get a feel for them, and then he would accept whatever my decision would be. I felt I had to say yes and I did.

Well, let me tell you, Sunday came and I was a fool of fools! His name was Matt, his wife was Sherry; kids were Joe @16, Sam @14, Frank @13, Adelle (Addy) @11, Margaret (ET) @10. They were all fit, well-behaved, quiet, respectful, and comfortable to be around. ET was a card, Addy was intense, the boys were all watching everything. Perfect nuclear family, all good-looking, all smart, humor was a trait for sure, a really nice family. They were winning me over. And then the kicker hit.

You see Matt became a DPM after being in the military. He put himself through medical school by being a paramedic. And in the military he was a combat medic…with two combat tours in Afghanistan. I looked over at Shane and he was just smirking like a kid who got away with the whole cookie jar. Shane suggested that Matt show me their everyday stash. What?

Matt invited me out to their diesel Ford Expedition and opened the rear hatch. There was a rollout truck vault, a gun storage unit. It had 7 AR-15s of various configurations, including a bad*$$ POF with a suppressor. The two smallest were “cute”, pink cammo, but ARs all the same. There was more but to go on about it would be ridiculous. I turned to Shane and asked him how soon they could move the family out to our place.

I got humbled that day, learned a lesson, again. Two ears, one mouth; listen at least twice as much as you speak. Matt’s family showed up with the mobile home latter in the week, got him hooked into the well and electrical system. The clinic shed came a week later with a small quiet generator. That little building went down close to the road but still within eyesight.

The teenage boys were a great addition to security, we kept Matt out of the rotation but “on call”. From then on out he was called “Doc”, he wore it well. Some day we can talk about the girls and Robbie’s boys.

I knew it was going to happen, and it did. When we got home from church that Sunday night we did the usual dinner together around a campfire. And yup, I caught hell from all of the adults for saying “no!” so much without knowing the whole story. I received a resounding vote of “no confidence” about 30 times that night, unanimous of course. Including me the last 25 or so times. It was a good night. Well, except for me being voted off the island 10 times, maybe more, I quit counting, they didn’t. It was brutal!

[Here is a serious one for you Dad. What was the scariest time or event for you?]

That will take a little thought. Can we do that tomorrow? I’m a bit tired.

[We left it at that. Dad looks a little pale and I noticed his lips are slightly blue as well. Maybe I am pushing him too hard.]

<- click here to read Chapter 5                                                                 click here to read Chapter 7 ->

Short Story Chapters –

• The Wars: Chapter 1
• The Wars: Chapter 2
• The Wars: Chapter 3
• The Wars: Chapter 4
• The Wars: Chapter 5
• The Wars: Chapter 6
• The Wars: Chapter 7
• The Wars: Chapter 8
• The Wars: Chapter 9
• The Wars: Chapter 10

 2009 - 2024 Copyright © AHTrimble.com ~ All rights reserved
No reproduction or other use of this content 
without expressed written permission from AHTrimble.com
No legal, economic, or financial advice is given, no expertise to be assumed.
See Content Use Policy for more information.

This is the fifth installment of my short story “The Wars”. If you haven’t already read Chapters 1 – 4 you can

< click here to read Chapter 1 >

< click here to read Chapter 2 >

< click here to read Chapter 3 >

< click here to read Chapter 4 >

Please read the Chapter 1 intro to understand a little more of this story.

Also, there is a disclaimer that you can read there as well.

[Two days later dad and I started up again. I asked him to talk about maybe his favorite soapbox topic, police – then & now. This is the result. Oh boy!]

Son, you hit a nerve there, you sure did. You already now how I feel about all of it but I imagine you want it written by someone who lived it, not one of those fancy historians who have written the books according to their agenda and political persuasion. You asked for it, so here goes.

Like so much in corrupted governments, the same thing happened to peace officers as they were originally called. By the early 2020’s we had law enforcement officers NOT peace officers, and it showed. Yeah, not many people remember that originally they were called peace officers, then they became police officers, and then eventually they called themselves law enforcement officers. Let that sink in a minute and listen to what your gut tells you about that name change.

Before the end of them it was almost comical how their propaganda had worked its magic on the public. They [cops] had a tough job, a dangerous job, to protect and serve. All pure bullshit!

They are the ones that made their jobs tough by their swagger, arrogance, and disregard for basic Constitutional rights. Hell, basic human rights! And their job wasn’t that dangerous. If I remember right, back then it barely made the top 20 most dangerous jobs behind business managers and landscape people and even golf course workers. You pull out their traffic accidents and poor health like their alcoholism, drug additions, obesity, and steroid use they weren’t even in the top 100 most dangerous jobs.

As far as to protect and serve, that stopped back in the 1940’s or 50’s, if it ever did exist. Any student of real history can see the pictures of the 1950’s & 1960’s peaceful civil rights protests with those cops sicking dogs on young kids, beating senior citizens with those billy-clubs, and even shooting some for no reason whatsoever other than they dared to peacefully stand up for their rights. And those cops got away with it. The history of the 20^th century police brutality is horrific when looking at actual facts and evidence.

I don’t remember the statistics exactly, you can look them up if you want to. It was something like 50+% of all murders went unsolved and 75% of all property crimes went unsolved. That is a total disaster, an epic fail by any measure or standard. But they sure could write traffic tickets! Law enforcement officers caused 100’s of billions of dollars of loss to the economy every single year.

They drove around in fancy shiny SUVs, pulling people over demanding IDs like we was Nazi Germany and they were the Gestapo. And it was perfectly legal for them to lie to people for whatever reasons they wanted. They could even trick people into giving up their rights like to remain silent or not be searched. And God forbid a SWAT team ever showed up, you were probably a dead man if you lived in the city or were black. There was simply no, or at least very little, accountability of cops, you were just at their mercy, and they had damn little of that.

Yeah, of course there were some good ones, I knew some, good men, damn good men. But they were far and few between. Funny, people would talk about bad cops were only a ‘few bad apples’. That was said only by stupid people or police propagandists. If there so many good cops, they why did they allow the bad cops to get away with their crap?

Now we know that there were a few good cops; and most cops had no problem pushing aside rights, liberties, and freedoms for their own purposes. Yeah, I said it, most cops were bad because they simply didn’t understand the law, the Constitution, the Bill of Rights, or the difference between right and wrong. Most of them were trained to be part of their gang; thugs with badges.

But what takes the cake was federal law enforcement. That was a bunch of scum buckets right there. Let me put this into perspective, by the early 2020’s the total number of federal law enforcement made the 6^th or 7^th largest army in the world! Yeah, think about that for a minute, if federal law enforcement were its own army, it would be the 6^th or 7^th largest army in the entire world!!!

Why in the hell would the USA need such a large army of law enforcement? Think it through David, that is enough cops to occupy some entire countries. And they did, ours.

Now add this in, they were complete failures at their jobs. The DEA [Drug Enforcement Agency] didn’t make a dent in America’s drug HUGE problem. CBP [Customs and Border Patrol] not only couldn’t protect the borders, they aided the invasion of illegals that nearly destroyed our country. Then there was the ATF [Alcohol Tobacco & Firearms] that existed solely to destroy 2^nd Amendment rights. Oh, then the DHS [Department of Homeland Security], oh yeah. That bunch of authoritarian clowns were to protect the homeland, bullshit! They were the ones that did the most damage, took away freedoms, persecuted decent folks, targeted patriots, and were the dark shadows destroying our republic. But nothing even came close to the FBI [Federal Bureau of Investigations] in depravity.

Over the years the FBI had built up their image to be these stalwart defenders of the weak and vulnerable, protectors of US citizens, and the enemy of criminals. Pure crap if there ever was!

It took years to finally expose the depths of their corruption and immorality. Don’t get me wrong, there was plenty of documentation in a bunch of books of exactly who these people really were. All you had to do was look at the first Director of the FBI, Hoover. From the very beginning of his working life in government and law enforcement this guy was an authoritarian. Hell, he would have been right at home in charge of the Gestapo, Hitler’s right-hand man. Well, when you think of it, he was; it was just the American version of it.

What started the real change exposing the FBI for who they really were was back in 2022 and 2023 when they started arresting senior citizens and pastor/preachers for praying and singing hymns at abortion factories. These pro-life folks were breaking no laws at all. They were just simply exercising their freedom of speech, freedom of religion, freedom to peacefully assemble, and supporting the right to life of babies. But, oh no! There was no way that the DOJ [Department of Justice] was going to allow people to exercise their God-given rights that are guaranteed by the First Amendment in the Bill of Rights. Oh hell no! They [DOJ] simply would not tolerate people trying to protect unborn babies from being killed, murdered, butchered.

So the DOJ made up their own laws and policies, and then sent the FBI to teach these people a lesson and send a message to all Americans. That message? Rights, freedoms, and liberties don’t mean a damn thing in the United States any more! We, the government will do as we please. And if you don’t please us we will arrest you, imprison you, or simply kill you. And the FBI did all three, with glee, smiles, and arrogance that you can’t imagine unless you saw it back then.

There are plenty of videos of what they did. It shows the utter arrogance of the FBI SWAT teams and not just the complete disregard of basic human rights, but their absolute contempt of everyday people, US citizens. The FBI became the ultimate example of thugs with badges. And back then no one dared go up against them. Why? Because they had files on just about every American. And at the drop of a hat they could manufacture a case against anyone. Add to that endless amounts of money to fund whatever anti-American program they desired. And then add to that, their very own team of lawyers and judges to defend them if they ever needed it. It was a criminal organization if there ever was one!

I remember a man, and old guy, 70’s for sure, he was handicapped too. If I am not mistaken he couldn’t even get around without a walker and he was on oxygen as well. I think his name was Robertson or Robinson, something like that. He was short, really overweight as well, something like 300+ pounds, maybe more, I don’t remember. Well, he was home-bound and liked the Internet to connect with folks he otherwise physically couldn’t be around.

Now this guy was a Christian, a patriot, conservative, a prepper, well thought of and loved by family and neighbors, and a church going man. Everything the FBI despised. He also didn’t like the President at the time, JoeyP [the President at the time was referred to as a pervert due to his well-known habits of being a pervert and sexual predator].

Well, one day he made a statement online that the FBI made sound like he was planning on killing the President at an upcoming local rally. Remember, this guy couldn’t even walk on his own and couldn’t breath without an oxygen tank.

So the FBI decided to send a message, you must support and serve our perv President or pay the price. So they decided to raid this guy’s house. And of course dozens of FBI SWAT team guys show up armed to the teeth like they were going to war; they even brought along a military armored vehicle. So they set off flash bang grenades and used the armored vehicle to smash in the front of his house. They stormed into his house and yelled “gun.” He was dead a second later, shot dozens of times.

No video by any of the FBI storm troopers’ body cams, no pictures released of the gun, or the body. But they did lay him outside on the sidewalk immediately afterwards, uncovered, rotting in the sun, for all of the press and neighbors to see. It was disgusting. But it was also typical of the FBI.

After the fall of the DC government and all the FBI files were finally released online it was revealed that this guy was going to die that day, period. To read the emails and texts of the FBI and DOJ was sickening. To imagine that people, let alone protect and serve clowns, could have such black and evil hearts was almost too much for people to accept. But it was there for all to see, finally.

The good thing, none of these clowns, these thugs, these minions of evil exist any more. Their agencies are all gone, every last one of them. And for good reason, they were never authorized in the Constitution to begin with. Nope, not a single one of them. The Founding Fathers knew what would happen, tyranny, oppression, pure evil. And they were right!

Thankfully at the final Constitutional Convention none of them were authorized and they were specifically prohibited from every being formed or created, or any federal law enforcement agency every again. The only exception was the US Marshal Service. They were authorized by the 30^th or 31^st Amendment, I don’t remember which. But their responsibility is very, very limited in scope, and their authority only extends to their specific job. Me, personally, I am glad to have the Marshall’s, good people from what I hear, respectful and diligent in staying within their job scope and within the bounds of the Constitution and Bill of Rights. And they do a good gob.

Come to think of it, I haven’t seen a Marshall in 10 or 15 years. No one does unless you are a federal criminal. Hell, you rarely see any peace officer any more unless they are investigating a crime. And that is as it should be, should have always been.

I guess that is the basic difference between the law enforcement officers of the early 21^st century and the peace officers now. You just don’t see them hardly at all. Well no, the main difference is respect. Peace Officers are respected now for the job they do and the moral character they have. Gone are the thug days, gone is the swagger, the arrogance, and their military uniforms and gear that made them look like the military. They are members of the community who are appreciated now because they do their job, they solve crimes.

They can’t protect us from criminals, we know that now, we don’t want a police state the likes that the US had become in the old days. There are the county Sheriffs and community Marshals. And not many at that. There is usually only a few Deputies in a Sheriff’s department and they stay busy investigating crimes. Same with local Marshals. Both county Sheriffs and Marshals are elected by the residents of their communities. Both serve 3-year terms, both can be pretty easily impeached. Deputy Sheriffs and Deputy Marshals are hired. Prospective hires are recommended by either the Sheriff or Marshal. Then a citizen committee, similar to a jury pool, review the applicants and makes the final hire decisions.

Any complaint against peace officer goes directly to a citizen committee, again similar to a jury pool, who reviews the complaint along with the supervisors input. A decision is then given as to what action to take, or not to take any action. Any promotion is handled the same way, a supervisor makes a recommendation, and once again a citizen committee reviews the promotion recommendation and makes the final decision. Any department-wide pay raises goes to a vote with the 75/75 rule.

Departments that truly serve their communities well, solve crime, and don’t abuse their authority are well paid, well rewarded, well respected, and truly a welcomed sight where they live. Others, well, they don’t last long, one way or another. Even their quarterly personnel performance reviews are posted on-line for public viewing.

And gone are the days of legally authorized thug behavior of the old law enforcement officers. There is no longer any such thing as “qualified immunity” of any kind. Peace officers must operate within the law, Constitutional law. The only justification for shooting a civilian is self-defense just like anyone else. And there better be witnesses or clear evidence to that fact or their can be big trouble for the officer. But they all wear body cameras now so there is little doubt as to what takes place in such situations.

By 2023 law enforcement was completely out of control, plus a complete failure. There were so many violations of rights, liberties, and freedoms it defies belief. And why it was tolerated for so long is almost unimaginable in today’s world. The number of shootings of unarmed people was staggering back then. Then there was also the sheer brutality of officers. Officers were either ignorant of the law or they just disregarded it in some weird twist of justification. Popular bullshit back then was “officer safety” which was a complete and utter joke. It was just used for cops to abuse people and disregard people’s rights.

Strange now where officers don’t have to have any specialized training or special certifications. Those things proved to be all but worthless. There was talk originally about making them have 2-year degrees in law but that was quickly dismissed when it started to smell like nothing more than more lawyers. There are schools and academies but they aren’t required. Each department is responsible for their officers, and their leadership is responsible to their citizens. It took a while but it all sorted itself out within a couple of years, maybe 5 or so. There is still the occasional bad apple but they don’t last long and are dealt with accordingly.

All that being said, I think there were three major moves that made the real differences in crime; 1) revised Castle Doctrine, 2) clarification of the Self-Defense Doctrine, 3) The Militias Act.

The Castle Doctrine back then might be confused as being controversial, but it wasn’t at all. After it all started and everything became scarce, including food, society devolved into a strange anarchy to a great degree. Theft was common, violence almost as much, and lots of folks simply not being safe even in their own homes. As the states broke away from the old federal government they moved to stop the problems. Obviously there wasn’t enough of the old law enforcement, they mostly disappeared, and I can’t blame them for a whole host of reasons.

The Castle Doctrine was simple, you could defend your home, including your land around it, from any criminal activity with whatever force was necessary. Yup, as you well know now that means you can kill any criminal committing a crime on your property, regardless of the crime. Mostly people only took it to the lethal extreme when it came to theft and assaults. But it worked, lot’s of criminals died within a year or so. Unfortunately, some people just trying to eat were killed as well.

One of the good things that did come out of it was charity. People started to care more about their neighbors when it came to hunger and starving. Neighbors, communities, and congregations started to do much more, virtually whatever they could, to make sure other families didn’t starve, especially those with kids.

But man-o-man, if you were a criminal, an evil doer, and tried to steal, assault, or kill on someone’s property, you ended up dead. And good riddance, should have been that way all along!

The Self-Defense Doctrine was just as simple, you could defend yourself with whatever force you needed to, including lethal force. Same applied to your family or any other person in imminent danger. Most folks always wore at least one gun on them, many carried a rifle during the worst of it. A lot of bullies and criminals got put in the ground during those years. But let me tell you, it better be pretty clear that is was self-defense or you were looking at murder charges.

The whole militia thing was another god-send! It is hard to imagine that in this country, the United States of America, militias were once vilified and virtually outlawed. But that was the old federal government law enforcement thing. The feds just saw militias as a threat to their authoritarian plans so they just eliminated them as source of competition. But, America was founded by militias during the early days of the American Revolution. And, the 2^nd Amendment was there to keep militias strong and viable to prevent a federal government from becoming authoritarian and imposing tyranny and oppression upon US citizens.

The Militias Act was passed to ensure that militias were once again the backbone of local communities and states, and, most importantly, a check & balance to federal power. And it sure does work!

Militias are now formed at the local level, usually in communities or at least on the county level. There are differences in how well organized and trained they are, as well as their arms. For the most part they are pretty effective small unit fighting forces. Essentially all militia units within a county come under a county leader, usually a Major. Groups of counties, mostly geographic in nature, come under the leadership of a Colonel. And those units come under the direction of the State Guard, a General. At the state level there is a small command company to support the General.

All militia members are authorized to own any weapon a 2020’s military member would normally carry. That would include a carbine, full-auto or semi-auto, and a pistol. Machine guns, such as the M249, M240, M14, M2, are kept in unit’s armory. Same thing for the Mk19, M203 grenade launchers and the M67 grenades. All larger crew served weapons are kept at the county level in their armory.

No one knows for absolute certainty but it is estimated that there are 10 million members of militias around the country; even quite a few in the compact states. Not only do foreign countries know it would be futile to invade America, criminals know that militias can be brought into action by local peace officers. See, it was also added that each militia member was also able to be authorized as a peace officer when called upon in an official capacity. America is back to the old posse days, and it’s never been safer for the most part.

Is there still crime? Yes. Are there still criminals? Obviously. But I am telling you, it is a lot better now than it was 25 or 30 years ago!!! One more thing, convicted criminals don’t last long. If I get this right, they get an automatic technical review of their case/conviction within 10 days of a guilty verdict and sentencing. If they appeal their conviction, the appeal has to be made within 48 hours. Their appeal mus be granted, or not, within 24-hours of that. If a retrial is granted it takes place within 60 days. That verdict is final other than an appeal to a state supreme court. There are damn few of them. There is no appeal to the federal supreme court anymore for criminal cases. People aren’t brought to trial unless it is pretty clear they did it. The ole innocent until proven guilty thing taken to heart.

Convicted criminals who are sentenced to death are usually dead with 10 days of their case, appeals, or retrials. There is no more spending 20 or more years on “death row”, that is just insanity. Justice is now served in a timely manner as outlined in the Constitution. Yeah, there are mistakes from time to time and a few innocents have been wrongfully put to death; very, very few. But woe unto those that caused that, they become criminals themselves.

Bottom line, it’s all about being a good person now. Follow the law, be good to others, and being held responsible for your actions.

It’s getting late David I want to stop for the night, I’m not feeling all that great. And besides, I want some of your wife’s fried chicken before its all gone with that pack of hoodlums you call kids!

<- click here to read Chapter 4                                                                 click here to read Chapter 6 ->

Short Story Chapters –

• The Wars: Chapter 1
• The Wars: Chapter 2
• The Wars: Chapter 3
• The Wars: Chapter 4
• The Wars: Chapter 5
• The Wars: Chapter 6
• The Wars: Chapter 7
• The Wars: Chapter 8
• The Wars: Chapter 9
• The Wars: Chapter 10

 2009 - 2024 Copyright © AHTrimble.com ~ All rights reserved
No reproduction or other use of this content 
without expressed written permission from AHTrimble.com
No legal, economic, or financial advice is given, no expertise to be assumed.
See Content Use Policy for more information.

This is the fourth installment of my short story “The Wars”. If you haven’t already read Chapters 1 – 3 you can

< click here to read Chapter 1 >

< click here to read Chapter 2 >

< click here to read Chapter 3 >

Please read the Chapter 1 intro to understand a little more of this story.

Also, there is a disclaimer that you can read there as well.

[I asked Dad to touch just a bit on the ‘why’ of us going to Arizona from Florida before he went into the whole story, which I assume is going to be interesting to say the least. I might have to correct his account if he strays from the exact truth. Or, maybe I should just inject my version of the story when Dad is done. Since I was right there and he was telling me the story while I recorded it and took notes. I am going to change the “you” when it makes sense to “David” to make it easier to understand who Dad was taking about. Yes, David is me.]

Okay, so you [me, David] remember we actually started talking about preparedness back during the Obama years. That d**kh**d Marxist Muslim prick. I mean I was into preparedness back in the 1970’s and 80’s when it was more of a ‘mother earth’ movement. So was the church, but to a slightly different degree back then. To me it just made sense. But I think it was about 2009 or 10 that we started talking seriously about it because we could see the country making the shift to real authoritarianism.

To be honest, that started in earnest back with George Bush in 2001 when the Muslims attacked the US on 9/11. That whole mess opened the door perfectly for the Patriot Act along with a whole host of other draconian laws that destroyed most liberties, freedoms and rights that we had left. And it started decades of wars that killed and maimed, physically and mentally, 10’s of thousands of good men and women in the military. America sure loved war back then. All those wars and conflicts made a lot of rich people a whole lot richer while killing Americans, and hundreds of thousands of innocent civilians in other countries that we invaded. Eisenhower called it the military-industrial complex. We could talk for days on that subject alone. Evil it was.

By the 2020’s we both saw how desperate the situation was becoming and got serious about what to do, exactly what to do. David knew almost everything to do on his own, I just threw my 2cents in when it was needed or asked for. In early 2023 David showed up with his 8’ x 20’ trailer pulled by his big ole Dodge Ram dually. Too bad you couldn’t afford a good truck like a Ford. [Yeah, he chuckled at his own joke. It was the age old truck rivalry thing. Dad was a Ford guy, I was a Dodge guy. Never shall the twain meet.]

That ole trailer was packed as tight as a man could get it; side-to-side, top-to-bottom. Just about everything that would make a serious prepper drool. No food though, no need for that, there was plenty here. We just parked it in the shade of a couple of big junipers, well hidden from the road or even the house. Didn’t want nosy neighbors or visors asking questions. We painted it first. That was fun, rolled on primer and a base coat, then lots of spray cans. I don’t remember what we finally called the camo pattern, but we sure laughed about it. Looked like a redneck graffiti job. But it worked, at least no one ever asked about it, or talked about it if they did see it. It was a bit windy the last day when we covered the whole thing with a camo net. That camo net made us feel better, not sure how much it helped if someone really wanted to see it from the air. But it did make us feel better about it and it did really break up the hard edge, straight line profile.

So that was spring 2023, maybe March or April, I don’t remember. Coming down the big hill wasn’t going to happen, so we brought it in the back way. A little muddy but we didn’t have to worry about trailer brakes or jack-knifing.There I was telling you how to do it and you being the heavy-haul specialty trucker. I think we argued for 3 straight hours. That sure was a lot of fun!

[Dad didn’t exaggerate at all. I am pretty sure it was 3 hours and we loved every minute of it. I am my father’s son. And I am proud of that.]

By the end of 2023 we knew it was just a matter of time. When F15 happened in early 2024 we knew it was close, real close. So David laid plans for their tactical withdrawal from Florida. Yeah, you are one smart kid I‘ll give you that. [I was 46 at the time. Some ‘kid’, eh? Dad was 69 by that time so I guess anyone under 60 was a ‘kid’ to the old man.] But, I didn’t know you were that smart. [Dad chuckled again. It is good to see him laugh, he hasn’t done much of that lately.]

You see Texas had already put the feds in their place. President Joe-the-Perv had opened the southern border up like laying out a welcome mat. Millions of foreigners poured across the border at will. Hell, the border patrol helped them, welcomed them, housed them, fed them, gave em free health care, debit cards for meals, transportation to the city of their choice, every damn thing you could imagine. And it was all intentional, purposeful, to accomplish their master plan. And it nearly worked! Damn them!!! It was treason, every bit of it, everyone one of them, TREASON!!  [I thought Dad was going to have a stroke. The veins in his neck and head started to stick out. That big one you could see the blood pumping through it.]

Anyways, Texas had kicked the border patrol off the border finally. Those Texas military boys went in there and started in some park that was a main crossing point for all these foreigners. They put up a shipping container wall with loads of razor wire on em. That stopped those b*stards in their tracks in short order and at minimal cost. Then they set up a full-blown military base and a couple of forward operating bases [FOBs]. It was sight to behold!

Well, JoeyP didn’t like that his plan, or rather his masters’ plan, was getting thwarted by a bunch of redneck Texans. He ordered border patrol to take it back and get the foreigners flowing again. Well, them city-slicker border agents show up at that park, base, and FOBs and tried to make entry. Uh, no. Those Texans told them to go to h*$$ by golly. It worked at all but one of the FOBs. Something about a bunch of soldiers standing around with M4’s and Hummers with Ma Dueces [50cal machine guns] mounted on them makes a bunch of CBP pretty boys with nothing but pistols want to turn around and leave. Except one idiot.

At one of the FOBs a border agent pulled his pistol, an H&K P2000 I think, I’m not sure, I think so though. Great pistols actually. Well, the Texans pulled up their M4’s, lot’s of shouting, all of em on both sides high as a kite on adrenaline and testosterone at that point. All the border clowns pulled their pistols, stupid move just from a ballistics point of view. No on knows why for sure, but a border agent fired a round and hit a Texan, then all hell broke loose.

When the shooting stopped all 12 border patrol agents were on the ground 9 dead, 2 critically wounded, 1 had only minor wounds. On the Texas side there were 10 injured, 3 seriously. The border patrol body armor was only rated for handguns and didn’t hold up to the M4 rounds. The Texans all had on body armor and plates. The 3 wounded Texans were all shot below the plates in the pelvis area. It is thought that the 3 were all shot by the same border agent who knew it was ridiculous to shoot center mass against military-grade body armor.

What really showed who the Texans were was the fact that they medivac’d all the wounded border agents out before their own men. That didn’t help sooth things over at all with the clowns in Washington. The CBP never showed up with their own medivac choppers; odd. One thing that did make a huge difference was within minutes, the video of the gun fight was released on the Internet clearly showing the border agents were the aggressors and instigated the encounter. It also showed the muzzle flash from the border patrol agent that started it all.

I found it interesting that for about 24 hours no one talked about what I saw the second time I watched the video. The CBP agent that fired first was standing next to one of the border patrol SUVs on the passenger side. If you looked hard through the heavily tinted windows you could see a man sitting in the front passenger side seat. He was on the phone from the very beginning of the released video. The passenger window was open slightly. Here is were it gets interesting. If you go frame by frame you can see the man in the SUV turn his head away from the phone and towards the agent beside the door next to him. Then the agent nods his head almost imperceptibly. A couple of seconds later he fires his weapon at multiple Texans.

As I’ve said from the very beginning, it was all a set-up and those CBP agents were sacrificed to light it all off. Wouldn’t the first time the damn federal government was behind something like this.

On day 2 all hell broke loose on the Internet. I think it was Glenn or Tucker that broke it first. They did it smartly, they simply asked questions; who was the man in the SUV, who was he talking to on the phone, what did he say to the agent standing next to the SUV and why? Were these all just coincidences? Of course they weren’t!!

Within 30 minutes the White House toilet bowl head of a press secretary came out with a joint statement from DHS, the NSA, and the FBI stating the video was an AI [artificial intelligence] deepfake product and was not real or from any device that was on site at the time. She took no questions. I doubt anyone other than complete morons believed her. All of those alphabet agencies are all well-known to be liars even giving a weather report. Hell, I don’t think those agencies could tell the truth about anything, ever!

Then it got worse.

The next day the FBI had issued arrest warrants for all the Texas Military folks that were there, the Texan commanding officer in charge of the border operation, and the commander of the Texas Military. Yeah, that didn’t go over well in Texas as you can imagine.

The Governor held a press conference and said this, “This is Texas, we have a long and rich heritage of standing against tyrants. In the words spoken nearly 200 years ago, with my minor change; Come and take them!” He wheeled himself off the stage and the Texas Military commander then spoke briefly. He said that the arrest warrants would not be recognized as legal, the FBI would not be tolerated, the military personnel were in protective custody on a Texas military base. Any attempt to arrest these men and women or enter a Texas Military facility would be met with all appropriate force, including lethal force.

Then it got worse.

A combined force of FBI HRT and SWAT teams approached the base that the commanding office was located on. This some 40+ FBI force showed up at the base main gate, they were met with Texans armed to the teeth, 7 Hummers with Ma Dueces mounted on them, and a freaking Bradly fighting vehicle. The FBI had 4 armored BearCats. Yup, a mismatch with the FBI on the losing end of that stick.

Now, I don’t know if I will remember it all as it really happened. But, as I remember it was a big ole Mexican stand-off. Eventually the FBI left without anyone in custody and no shots fired. One thing they did do was video everyone on the Texas Military side. Then the Texans did the same thing, posted it on Youtube that night. Youtube took the Texans’ down but by then it was everywhere on the web, including X and Rumble. Those sites didn’t take it down, at least they still believed in free speech and not bowing to the government god. Now everyone knew who the FBI was, individually, by name, they couldn’t hide themselves anymore.

I think it was the next day some Texans, not the Texas Military, found the FBI guys at a Holiday Inn Express in Austin. Might have been San Antonio, I don’t remember for sure. So the FBI guys had all their vehicles neatly parked backed into a block retaining wall. All nice and neat like a showroom or some parade thing. Well, that night a couple of semi trucks and two concrete trucks parked right in front of that nice neat row of them city boys’ toys.

Turns out that all the tires on the semis and the concrete trucks had holes drilled in them, flat as pancakes. And yes, the concrete trucks were full of dried concrete and the semi truck trailers were full of recycled cardboard bales. None of those government rides could get out and no one would come tow away the trucks. Not even a US military unit from Ft. Bliss would come help out. From what I hear a bus came in from Las Cruces to haul those FBI thugs back to whatever hole they crawled out from.

But it wasn’t all fun and games. I didn’t hear about it at the time, I learned about it a couple months later. North of Lubbock, Texas the FBI raided a Texas Military man’s home thinking he was there. They identified him as one of the leaders in the original shootout. Turns out only his wife and 4 kids were there along with their dogs. When all was said and done the house was in ashes and all were dead, bodies burned, including the dogs. Well, there was the boy, a teen about 13 or 14, right in the middle of it he came running out of the house with his dad’s shotgun. The FBI hauled the boy’s body off before the County Coroner could get there. But rumor has it there was over 30 bullet holes in the kid.

That FBI taskforce was only 20 or so folks. They stayed the night in Lubbock and headed back to their field office in Dallas the next morning. They stopped for breakfast in Snyder at some upscale eatery place. When they came out there was well over 100 armed men and women waiting for them. Rumor has it they [FBI] eventually put down their weapons and surrendered. Didn’t help them any. There are plenty of pictures of them all zip tied to the chain-link fence behind the restaurant. All of them had been shot at least a dozen times and their FBI badges were pounded into foreheads. Justice served. People just weren’t going to take it anymore.

Strange, not a single Snyder cop was in the area at the time, or available to respond at all. The County Sheriff’s department reportedly was at a training in El Paso along with all surrounding Sheriff’s departments. The only available Texas DPS officer was responding from Wichita Falls about 150 miles away.

FBI personnel were dispatched from El Paso, Oklahoma City, and Dallas. While those agents were in transit someone raided the FBI office in Dallas and stole everything and then burned the place to the walls. Huh, seems there was a problem with dispatching Dallas emergency services, not a single LEO or fire unit responded to the call.

At this point the US was really at war with itself, serious war. All hell was breaking loose.

Shortly after all of that went down the ATF, not to be outdone by the FBI, started raiding gun stores and then gun ranges that rented full-auto firearms to customers. That didn’t last long. By the third day of the raids three different ATF teams were basically slaughtered. The showed up in their typical Nazi SS raid style but they were ambushed. No prisoners were taken, people were over all of that by then, it was all out war. People were just fed up with the feds and saw them for who they really were, finally Saw them as nothing more than thugs and arrogant bullies with fancy badges.

By in large the ATF ceased to exist due to the casualties and those who just simply left never to return to the office. Whoever remained were absorbed into the FBI. The few, very few, FBI agents who were actually honoring their Constitutional oath deserted from the FBI within about 2 weeks of hostilities breaking out. There were damn few decent law-abiding FBI agents with any morals who left. Most agents were nothing more than thugs that got a rush from the badge, pushing people around, killing folks, and no one to stop them. Hell, no one to really even challenge them back then. The DOJ always protected them from any criminal charges.

Most, not all, police departments weren’t much better, at least not in the larger cities. As everything started to fall apart every big city police department went into full-blown martial law authoritarian mode. They didn’t think it through and realize what was actually happening and the root cause of all of it. They just wanted to exert authority over everyone. The absolute worst was New York City, oh my gosh! Chicago was a close second.

NYPD started with a dusk-to- dawn curfew but the mobs were just too much to handle. Then they went into a state of emergency with officially declaring martial law with a 24/7 curfew. When the violence just got worse the cops started firing on mobs. I think it was the third, maybe fourth, time they did that the gang members in the crowd fired back. The video made it look like a running gun battle from from Cartel City.

Within a week or two the cops were defeated, some 1000+ killed and maybe another 2000 – 3000 wounded. The gangs then took over the streets until the NY National Guard showed up. Heavily armed military folks with Hummers, machine guns, snipers, M4s, and a couple grenade launchers thrown in for good measure pretty much ruled the day. The NYPD then conducted retaliation raids. Blood flowed.

[Dad, Hayden wants the story of us leaving Florida. Could you just stick with that for now?]

Come on, I had to set the stage, layout the context so it is clear why you did what you did. Patience son, patience.

So the wars had started, basically everyone against everyone else. The worst of it was the law enforcement, they just wanted martial law and to control everything and everyone. Yeah, the Constitution and Bill of Rights was secondary for the most part. But it wasn’t national martial law yet, but pretty damn close.

Most states had set up road blocks on any kind of major roadways into their state. Most of them were looking for criminals, people with guns, and illegal aliens that had been invading for months causing crime, chaos, and havoc. Yeah, I mean them illegal aliens from the southern border. But Texas was also looking for any federal law enforcement officers. Go figure. People were getting real paranoid by then and knew a civil war was coming. A bunch of us knew it had already started.

So Hayden, you know back then your dad, my son David, was a pretty smart cookie. I can’t speak to the here and now though. [Dad loves it, Hayden understands it. I allow it. What a weird sense of humor, he always had it. Most never got it.] David and I had been talking for a long time about prepping and he was pretty dang dialed in. After he delivered the trailer back in 2023 we both agreed it was just a matter of time. While he was here we did a little work on the cabin, my shop at the time, including some electrical and plumbing work as well. We even spent some time expanding the area were we had planted the raspberries and blackberries in the fall. Doubled those patches. He got off easy on the blueberries though, had to do them myself.

Anyways, David had been doing that heavy-haul trucking for years and knew everyone in the business it seemed. The job he hated the worst was picking up the Abrams tanks at the Port of Miami and hauling them to different plants for major overhaul work or salvaging. The tanks were pretty shot up from Iraq and Afghanistan but hauling them paid well.

In early 2024 another round of those tanks were coming into Miami and being shipped mostly to a plant in Oklahoma. David was hauling wind turbine blades at the time but that kid is smart. He stopped doing that and returned home to Tampa and resumed doing crane maintenance through the union. He wanted to be close to home. And of course putting the final touches on his exfill plan. [SOF term for exit plan.] And he made contact with a good friend of his that was hauling tanks and made an arrangement with him. A $5,000 arrangement to be exact. Worth every penny!

When it all was ready to go down the crapper David contacted his guy who was more than grateful for the $5k and the opportunity to stay home. David got his buddy’s truck and headed for the Port of Miami. Fortunately for David the paperwork only had the truck and trailer ID and not a named driver. The next day he was pulling into a truck stop on I-4 where he met up with your mom, and you, plus Robbie, his wife and their two kids.

See David had already started a pilot-car business the year before and was licensed to do that work, and he could use any licensed driver he wanted. Robbie’s van was also on the company paperwork and insurance as well. So now David had two pilot-cars, vans actually, and they had both families in them. And rather than the standard yellow emergency flasher-warning lights, they were red. He had also swapped out yellow lenses on the truck for reds as well. Off they went, north on I-75, then west on I-10.

There wasn’t a single problem of any kind until Texas. He hit that border and there was no way around the roadblock, they were stopping everyone, including David’s little caravan. He timed it to hit Texas about 3am to get every advantage of sleepy cops at the roadblock. That kinda worked, but not really. It was David’s cocky attitude and confidence that won the day.

He didn’t really think they were going to let him pass at first but the bunch of flashing red strobe lights and the US Army Abrams tank was a sight to behold I bet.

He was headed to I-45 where he was to turn north towards Oklahoma according to the wide-load paperwork. The cops basically didn’t want to allow the tank in the state for the US Army but David told them that he didn’t get paid unless they delivered it. That made them a little sympathetic. The two pilot cars did raise a red flag to the cops. But David handled that without missing a beat. He explained that Florida was simply too dangerous to leave his pilot car drivers’ families home without their dad’s.

Once again, sympathy won out, decent cops. However, had they checked they might have questioned why there was only one dad driving but two families. But I am sure David would have handled that just fine as well.

And to add to all of the great planning, all of their equipment, clothes, food, guns, ammo, and tactical gear were safety stored inside of the tank. And they had spot welded the tank hatches closed. All that was in the vans was minimal clothing, toys, snacks, etc.. They looked exactly like they said they were; nothing out of the usual, not a single item to worry about, not any kind of weapon, nothing, had the cops done a close inspection. They hit I-45 a couple hours later and headed north at maximum legal and safe speed I am sure.

They hit Oklahoma state line about mid-day and crossed without incident or even stopping. They hit I-40 and turned west. A couple hours later they were doubling-thinking their plan to wait and do the 3am thing going back into, and through, Texas at the panhandle. They decided to just push on and let David work his magic.

Remember the paperwork said the load was headed to some factory in Oklahoma, that was now the opposite direction they were headed. David came up with a brilliant plan once he heard how the roadblock was set-up over the CB from other truckers. Texas DPS and DOT were working together and had the left lane open but pulled everyone over into a weigh station which was full and a long, almost two-mile long, back-up.

They had already stopped to fuel-up and eat before hitting the state line. They wanted to hit the state line just as it was getting dark and all those red emergency flashers would be putting on quite a show for everyone at the roadblock.

As they got close to the roadblock their little caravan stayed in the left lane as if they owned it. They did slow down a bit as they passed the first DPS cruisers, but they didn’t stop and did stay in the left lane. Nothing happened and no pursuit. As they approached the weigh station with everyone pulled over and cops all over the place they approached like the roadblock was for everyone else, not them. The troopers simple waved at them as they entered Texas. Same thing as they hit New Mexico three hours later. Arizona was a different story.

Arizona State Guard was manning the border and they meant business. There was a Bradly fighting vehicle there complete with a 25 mm M242 Bushmaster chain gun. They had barriers set up to make vehicles zig-zag through them and there was no by-pass lane of any kind. They didn’t yield way to David’s caravan. Not only did they stop him, they made them pull over into a special parking area. A Major walked over with two large MP types.Everyone stayed in the vans, David was the only one that got out.

After the Major looked over the paperwork, David explained to the Major that before he could deliver the tank to the plant in Oklahoma he had been called by the trucking broker to redirect to the Port of San Diego as quickly as possible due to some kind of BS emergency. The Major got on his cell phone and spent 20+ minutes talking to someone. When he got back to David he was not impressed.

There was no record of any kind that he could find that indicated that the tank was supposed to be anywhere but in Oklahoma. Undeterred David kept talking and trying to explain with everything going on it wasn’t surprising there wasn’t any readily available paperwork or tracking info. About that time your mom and Robbie’s wife came over with two very unhappy crying and screaming kids. Alice, your mom, winked at David and he went a whole different direction with the conversation.

David realized the roadblock was out in the middle of nowhere, new plan! He very politely asked the major for a favor, for help with the kids, the families. He wanted to take the load, pilot cars included, to Holbrook, about 80 miles to the west. There was a large truck stop there with a motel. He wanted to get the kids some food and into bed since they weren’t doing well. The kids even cried louder as if on cue. The wives had pinched them. He told the Major it would be impossible to try and escape with a 60 ton army tank on his trailer. And he offered to have the Major send an escort or put an Apple air tag on the tank to prove they would go to, and stay at, the truck stop.

The Major had a heart and saw that there was no threat there but he did tell David that a trooper would meet him in Holbrook at the truck stop. If he failed to show up he would send a highly-trained Javelin missile crew or an Apache helicopter after him. [Of course he was joking, the Major even smirked a little.] An hour and a half later he pulled into the Holbrook truck stop found a spot, parked, and met up with two men in a Hummer. They called the Major as the kids started crying again, short conversation, the men left, all was good.

Twenty minutes after the Hummer pulled out they were grinding the spot welds off, supplies and gear transferred to the vans, then the trailer was unhooked, and the little caravan was headed south minus the red strobe lights on. He was here early morning, minus the tank of course. Everyone pretty much slept the entire rest of the day, everyone needed it. I spent the day watching over everyone, AR-15 in hand being the bad a$$ I was. Lisa spent the day cooking for a huge comfort-food dinner that we all pigged out on that night.

And that is how you ended up here in Arizona and the Arizona State Guard ended up with an inoperable M1 Abrams tank. Well, there was a rumor going around that while the tank couldn’t be driven, there was nothing wrong with it loading and shooting. I imagine it was put to good use.

<- click here to read Chapter 3                                                                 click here to read Chapter 5 ->

Short Story Chapters –

• The Wars: Chapter 1
• The Wars: Chapter 2
• The Wars: Chapter 3
• The Wars: Chapter 4
• The Wars: Chapter 5
• The Wars: Chapter 6
• The Wars: Chapter 7
• The Wars: Chapter 8
• The Wars: Chapter 9
• The Wars: Chapter 10

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